What Mobile Phone

G'Day Deserter,

If you can wait another 12 months, NextG will have better coverage and a greater range of phones.

Just get the one that suits you best.

Regards

Rolande

CDMA was great with reception available from high points most often. But that is being rplaced by next g wich is barely better than normal mobile reception.
Telstra is the only option for decent coveradge

We live 20km north of Bundaberg, 6km by road (3-4km overland) from the coastal town of Moore Park and can't get mobile coverage of any sort CDMA or other

There is no good GSM or Next G networks around and never will be, the only way to get good coverage is a sat phone.

Will cost you between $500 to $1500+ and $35+ per month, people may say its expensive but what price do you put on your life and others.

We always have GSM as our main phone and a CDMA for more range, it use to be good, the same car kit with external antenna fitted both phones until the dismise of the CDMA network......some thing about people between the ages of 3 to 25 years wanted phone to do everything, internet, video, pictures mp3s etc.

I supose when you get over 25 years old your not important enough.....or those great guys at Telstra thinks that is what we all want. To bad someone don't by the old CDMA network.

As a back up and information we have a HF radio on the VKS network.

We also have a sat phone.

Regards Richard

you have joined the same boat as many many others. there will be no prepaid on the next g network.........we are not profitable enough for telstra. there will be a nokia g phone available mid-year even though telstra keeps saying no. there will be another netork set up by optus (and others) to 'rival' the next g - though that may be just talk to keep the share market happy. current next g phones are very cute and fancy and can do all sorts of things except enable you to phone from any distance from a main centre of population - what telstra conveniently forgets to tell you is that 98% of the pop. only lives in 70% of the land mass. so those of us who wish to travel into the boonies will need a satphone or hf system. will this matter to telstra or their majority shareholder - not a bit.........unless you wish to email, watch tv, download music/videos then don't apply here should be their motto. unfortunately all the telcos will run the same message. no telco is offering a simple system that will just let us do an et - i.e. be able to phone home or let home phone you...............nothing else just a simple call system is all that is needed. anyway do we really need them in the bush?????? rgds

It's a funny thing, we use Nokia 6310I mobile phones for our business and about 3 years ago the telco's stopped offering them on there plans. We spoke to Nokia Australia about it and there reply was "Nokia do not do this phone any more, all the users want small phones that can do every thing".

The strange thing is it is still Nokia's biggest selling business phone in Europe and the current model BMW's and Merc's have them as an option, you can buy them through BMW and Merc in Austrslia.

So just who do they want to make money out of, the ones who are still at school and rake up $3000 bills that they can't pay for.

mmmmm makes you think.

When I did a marketing course they touched on the big companys targeting children, "get them when they are young and you have then for life", just like the cig and alcohol companys do.

Regards Richard

Regards Richard

I have converted to NextG from CDMA, I travell all over in my Job, I am not going to worry about an External Antenna , I get good coverage prior to and after all towns from Perth to Port Hedland , The reason I am not getting an External Antenna is that with CDMA and now NextG the Antenna will only give a few Klm extra from when signals drop out , I don't see the benefit, plus the GPS becomes the Hands free kit going through a second Car radio left on 88.5 or whatever frequency you want in the FM range, I have the perfect setup

wait a few months and nokia will be releasing a phone with gps navigator in it. N95 i think.

I just pulled up the Next G area map. Our farm at Dinninup (yes - you've never heard of the place - but it is in the south west and not far from civilisation) had some coverage with the old analogue. Then they brought in CDMA and no cover for miles around; only a few years ago expanding the network to cover the area in high patches at least. The map shows a big white area (satellite phone only) over the farm although across the road the crown land bush block is the next G range!

Deserter,
Next G prepaid mobiles will be available from May 15th. If you want to know more go to this site: Site Link You can find out just about anything you want to know there about any phone. I have learned quite a bit from the folks on that forum - including that most new mobiles don't work very well without a memory card. Son has just bought a Nokia N95 but might have to wait a while to get full use of same and also will have to buy more detailed maps before using it to navigate beyond the limits of his town.
OzeSheila.

According to Telstra, they will be introducing a NextG Prepaid service "soon".

Me, I'm not converting until I have to. I am waiting to see what Nokia releases for their NextG compatible Phones. Nokia, I believe, have superior solutions for in-car kits with external aerial connections.

Some of our freinds and us travel upto the Flinders Rangers a bit, we have a external antenna on our CDMA and they don't.

Over 5 hours we loose reception for about 5 to 10 minutes, they loose reception for about 75 minutes.

In the future mobile phones wont have an extermal antenna conection at all because in Europe and Asia they have towers everywhere and the distances between towns is so much closer.

Lets forget about Australia......

Regards Richard

Next G is crap !,,

There are still areas everyehere that don't work, and we travel a bit , and we compare phone signal strengths, every time we pull up ,,ect
My Mrs Pre-paid Optus digital works in heaps more places, than my Telstra next G phone.
In Wonthaggi township, ( where we live ) I have to walk over to the Nth side of my house to talk on my Next G phone, and there are still areas on the S/W side of town that have absolutely no reception, and Wonthaggi is considered to be relatively flat.

But what do you do,? Follow the Giant ,?,, why don't they put ap a satelite or 2 ?

Beats me why they can't ,, not exactly the poorest company in Oz

Cheers
Bucky